


Tales From the Baby Book

by TaraHarkon



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angus Bluejeans, Angus is a Blupjeans Baby, F/M, Fear, Morning Sickness, Nightmares, Pregnancy, Toddlers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-05
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-05 22:02:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15180314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TaraHarkon/pseuds/TaraHarkon
Summary: A series of drabbles based on my now-several Angus Bluejeans fics. These fill gaps in the timeline or just add some fluff.





	1. Early Mornings

**Cycle 99**  
Lucretia had given Lup and Barry an unfinished journal, a framework set up for them to fill in with their own memories. It was a baby book and it was a way for them to record the life of the happy little miracle the crew knew as Angus Bluejeans, the universal nephew. And they did, until the day Lup disappeared, until the day they forgot, until the day Lup took Angus and left, until the day Barry died so he wouldn’t forget, until the day Lucretia left Angus with Magnus or with the kindly old Mister McDonald or kept him with her. There are a thousand and one ways their story could have gone, but each tale contains one constant: a bright-eyed half-elven boy with curly hair, glasses too large for his small face, and an enthusiasm for life that few could match. These are those stories, these are the tales from the baby book.  
  


* * *

 

  
Lup lay on her side and groped blindly with her eyes still closed. She didn’t want to be awake yet. She didn’t want to even think about the concept of awake yet. And here she was, wide awake before the sun with a growing feeling of nausea. She finally managed to grab Barry’s arm and gave him a gentle shake.

“Bear?”

He woke up with a grunt and rolled onto his back. Blinking a few times, he made a tired noise of confusion. Lup leaned against him.

“I feel gross. I’m gonna puke and your kid is tap dancing on my bladder. Doesn’t even have rhythm.”

Barry looked at her oddly, squinting without his glasses on.

“What?”

Lup rested her head on his chest.

“Morning sickness, babe. Probably not gonna actually puke, just feel like it. Also, I gotta pee. But you’re comfy and the bed is warm and I’m complaining because I don’t want to get up.”

Barry nodded a little, not entirely awake yet.

“Mornings are homophobic...”

“Exactly, Bear.”

Reaching for the little shelf above their bed on the Starblaster, Barry grabbed his glasses and jammed them on. Then he kissed her forehead.

“I’ll warm you back up when you get back.”

Lup grumbled but pulled herself out of the blankets slowly.

“You’re not allowed to use the sexy voice, Barold. I’m gross and pregnant and nauseous and none of this is sexy voice appropriate.”

Barry sat up, watching as she went to the little bathroom tucked in against one wall of the room they shared.

“You’re plenty sexy, babe. And I contributed to this whole uh... thing, so I don’t think I’m allowed to complain even if I wanted to.”

Lup closed the door to the bathroom with a shouted.

“Stop making domesticity sexy! I’m not awake enough for this!”

A few minutes later, Lup reappeared and crawled back into the bed. She snuggled against Barry, putting her cold feet against his legs. He yelped and tried to pull away and she clung closer. 

“Liar! You said you’d help me get warm again!”

They were both laughing as he tried to escape the range of her legs.

“You didn’t tell me you were going to dip your feet in ice, babe!”

He turned the tables then, hugging her tightly. Then they heard someone banging on the wall between rooms. Taako’s voice rang out in a message spell.

_ “Cut it with the domestic bliss, ya nerds. Some of us are trying to sleep.” _

Lup sat up and yelled back, not bothering with a spell slot.

“Some of us don’t get to sleep, Koko!”

_ “Sounds like a you problem, Lulu!” _

Lup turned, an expression in her eyes that Barry had seen many times. It could lead a few places but none of them were safe.

“Hey Bear, what school is Thaumaturgy?”

Barry looked at her uncertainly for a long moment.

“It’s a cantrip, babe. You uh... you can’t spell-shape a cantrip.” He guessed at her plan and watched the little frown play across her lips. “So, no, you can’t blast only Taako with noise.”

She sighed expressively and snuggled closer.

“ _ Damn. _ And I had a great plan and everything.”

Barry tucked the blankets in around her and hugged her close.

“How about we go back to sleep instead?”

Lup smiled and reached to take his glasses off, tossing them up onto the shelf.

“I like the sounds of that.”


	2. Fireflies?

**Cycle 104** \- Lup and Angus on the road

* * *

 

Lup was exhausted. She sort of wanted to just sit down and meditate where she was, if she was being perfectly honest. And the added weight of a squirming, irritatingly wide awake toddler was the absolute definition of not helping. She sighed and looked around. It was getting dark out and that meant it was time to make camp either way. She was going to have to convince Angus that half-elves needed to sleep even if he didn't agree just yet and that meant setting up their bedroll and getting him into his pajamas. Angus clung tightly to her shirt, his head resting against her shoulder as she came to a stop.

"No sleep, Mama. The sky isn't tired yet."

He mumbled it and she couldn't help but smile.

"How do you know, Ango? Did you ask?"

The little boy giggled and she set him down. He stretched his arms wide and then sat, watching her unroll the sleeping bag that she kept strapped to the outside of her pack.

"Mama?"

"Yes, baby?"

Angus rocked a little, hands on his feet.

"Caaaaan I stay up late?"

Lup smiled over at him.

"Why?"

He looked at her, shocked and a little dismayed.

"Mama! That's my question! Not your question! You're supposed to know all the whys."

She couldn't help but laugh at the indignant look on his little face, especially with those new glasses of his taking up most of the available real estate.

"I don't know everything, my little dude. You know that. Especially not about what's going on in that smart little head of yours."

Angus got very carefully to his feet, wobbling slightly. He was still so very young and sometimes Lup was nervous when she watched him tentatively exploring his world. What if she did something wrong? What if she looked away for too long and he got hurt? Or... What if if she couldn’t do this? 

“I wanna see the fireflies.”

He collided with her leg and she laughed as he hugged tightly.

“Pleeeeaaaase?”

She sat on the sleeping bag and pulled him into her lap. 

“What fireflies, Ango? I haven’t seen any. Have you been holding out on me, bubbeleh?”

Angus giggled and shook his head, one finger raised towards the sky.  
  
“Those fireflies, Mama!” He said it with a tone that thought she was being very silly. “The up the sky ones.”

Lup followed his gaze and smiled. The stars were coming out. Hadn’t she taught him about stars before now? Then he adjusted his over-large glasses again and it struck her. He hadn’t been able to see them before. They would’ve been too far off. Laying back she let him wiggle down beside her.

“Alright, my dude, are you ready for some of that good nerd stuff you love? Those rad little lights aren’t fireflies, my man. Those are stars. I know, I know, what’s a star, Mama?”

He was laughing as she spoke, wiggling even now.

“Soooo? What’s a star, Mama?”

“I’m getting there, baby. Let’s get you into some pajamas and I’ll tell you all about them. And I’ll even throw in a story,  _ if _ you promise to sleep.”

Angus considered, his thumb slipping into his mouth. Then after a long moment, he nodded.

“Deal.”

“Sweet.”

And Lup reached for her bag to grab the little red feet-in pajamas that were tucked in there for him.

“So, once upon a time, a god named  Araleth Letheranil and he thought it was too dark at night...”

She had gotten her wiggly child into his pajamas and he had curled up beside her using her crimson robe as an extra blanket. When the story came to an end, she looked over. He was fast asleep and purring softly. Lup smiled and brushed his messy curls back from his face. She took his glasses and tucked them beside his boots where they wouldn’t get broken. Then she put an arm around him and closed her eyes, dropping into meditation with a small smile tugging at her lips.


	3. Darkness

**Cycle 101 - In the Sizzle It Up With Taako wagon**

Barry opened his eyes slowly, the world around him dark and blurry as he came up out of sleep. At first, he wasn't sure what had woken him. Then he heard another shaky cry and jolted upright. He ducked his head out of habit, just barely missing the shelf above his bunk in the wagon, and cast a dim light near the crib. Angus was standing, cheeks flush, and little hands tightly gripping the side rail of the crib. He shook the bars and looked up, sniffing. Barry picked him up and held him close to his chest.

"Ango, buddy, it's okay. Everything's okay, I promise. What's wrong?"

The little boy only had so many words. He was so small, so young. Half-elves didn't age at the same rate as humans and certainly, he was far beyond where  _ Taako _ usually expected him to be, but Taako was expecting an elf. 

"Bad. Bad bad. Dark."

Barry nodded. Maybe that was it. Maybe Angus was afraid of the dark like Barry was. That would make sense, in the grand scheme of things. Children frequently shared phobias with parents. Right? That was a thing, right? Fuck, he didn't know. All he knew was that his son was upset and something was wrong and he didn't know what. Rocking him gently, Barry called the dancing light closer just in case that was it.

"Want a story, buddy? Or uh... or do you just want the light to stay?"

Angus sniffed and clung to Barry's shirt. 

"Dada."

Barry smiled and kissed the top of his head. Was Angus just lonely?

"Alright. How about I sit down though? Maybe we can both get some sleep."

Angus nodded a little, wiping his small face on Barry's shirt.

"I've got you, buddy. And tomorrow, I'm gonna enchant you a little night light. How's that sound?"

Angus sniffed again, burying his face into Barry's shoulder. Well, that was fine. In the morning, he could worry about a nightlight and figuring out what was bothering Angus so much it had woken him up. Until then, this was fine. 

When Taako woke up, Barry Bluejeans was sitting on the floor of the wagon, holding his infant son in his arms. They were both fast asleep, Angus with one hand gripping Barry’s shirt tightly. Taako smiled slowly and went to make breakfast. He didn't want to wake either of them. They were too damn cute like this though. It was criminal. When the smell of breakfast finally wafted into the wagon, Angus woke up sniffing the air in a much more excited way than the night before.

"Dada! Dada!"

Barry was startled into wakefulness and he reached for his glasses, only to remember where he was.

"Smells like Taako's already up. How about we get you into a clean shirt, grab my glasses, and then we go see what's cooking?"

Angus nodded excitedly and Barry stood, still holding him tight. Jamming his glasses on, Barry turned towards the door of the wagon. Time to start another day on the road as part of Sizzle It Up with Taako.


	4. Baby's First Purr

Lup lay back on the couch, looking out the window at the sky of this world that would be their home. The Relics were already out, plan in place, blah blah blah. She was holding Angus on her chest and purring softly as she watched the clouds pass by.

"That one looks like... a robot. Not that you know what a robot is yet, little dude. But it totally does. And that one... looks like a mongoose."

Angus looked up at her with his wide eyes and reached to grab her shirt, pulling at it a little. Lup brushed his hair back from his face. It was already starting to go curly like Barry's and she thought it was the cutest thing how it curled around the little points of his ears. Her purrs grew louder now and she rested one hand on his back. A new sound reached her ears then and Lup went quiet. A very soft purr, rumbly and uncertain, was coming from the baby in her arms. Lup gasped softly and started purring again, as loud as before, a proud smile on her face. Being perfectly honest, she and Taako had never spent enough time around half-elves to know if they could purr or not and she'd wondered if Angus would. Maybe... maybe wondered wasn't the right word. It was more that she worried he wouldn't, that she wouldn't be able to bond with him like that. And now, here they were and he was purring like a tiny engine in her arms.

"Hey babe," Barry leaned over the back of the couch. "Hungry? Taako said dinner should be ready soon."

She put a finger to her lips and pointed excitedly at Angus. He reached down to put his hand on Lup's, feeling the vibrations. Barry's eyebrows shot up and then a smile crossed his face.

"He just started today," Lup whispered.

Barry moved around to sit on the floor beside them. 

"Think he'd uh... think he might purr for me too, babe?"

"Wanna find out, Barry?"

She carefully lifted Angus and set him in Barry's arms. Barry tensed for a moment, still nervous holding his son. Then he leaned back against the couch and tried to relax.

"Did... did you do something to get him to purr or did he just...?"

Lup leaned down and kissed the top of Barry's head.

"Just relax and he will too, that's all there is to it."

Barry looked down and Angus blinked up at him sleepily. 

"Just relax. Yeah, I can do that..."

Angus tugged on Barry's shirt and Barry hummed quietly, trying to soothe him again. After a moment, the little boy closed his eyes and began to purr. Barry looked up at Lup, eyes wide and excited. She leaned against him and brushed Angus' hair back from his face again. 

"Knew he would," she whispered. "Didn't question it for a minute."


End file.
